After the awakening, Edna begins to paint and tries to create her own work very often. She becomes to aware the new sensation that appears in her mind. She senses so much feelings and ideas which are new to her and she expresses them through the way of her own creation of art. In this way, Edna sees art as a way of self-expression and of self assertion. Also, she appreciates the music (the piano playing of Mlle. Reisz) more and is often easily touched. Those music feels completely different to her after her awakening to her self-consciousness because the music seems to combine or mix together with her new senses and it's also like the music makes her senses sharper and even more impressionable. What's more, I think the "piano playing" also symbolizes the social regulation. Both Adele and Mlle. Reisz play piano. However, Adele dose so as the entertainment for her husband and children and also for the parties. She doesn't play for art but still considered as a "good musician."
             On the other hand, the real musician, Mlle. Reisz, only granted as a musician by Robert and Edna. You would only be recognized when you follow the rules and regulation of the society, or your accomplishment would be shunned and disparaged.
             Edna is well dresses at the beginning of the novel, and slowly as the story goes, she removes her clothes. The clothes she wears are just like the social confine and rules in her life. As she gradually shedding of the clothes, it's just like she's getting away from those rules and confination, and begins to aware the self-consciousness and the internal state of her self. When Edna commits suicide, she finally takes off all her clothes and be in the embrace of the merciless ocean. It symbolizes that she has finally freed herself from the constraint which come from her husband and the conventional society, also, from her children.
             The ocean here in The Awakening is the symbol of fr...